Days of Bloodshed in Moscow[2]

Published:First published in 1926 inLenin Miscellany V.

      Published according to the manuscript.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1972,

      Moscow,Volume 9,

      pages336-341.Translated:The Late Abraham Fineberg and Julius KatzerTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2004).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Geneva, October 10 (September 27), 1905

Anew outbreak of the workers’ insurrection—a mass strike and street
fighting in Moscow. On January 9 the first peal of revolutionary action by the
proletariat thundered forth in the capital. The rumbling of this thunderclap
reverberated throughout Russia, and with unparalleled rapidity roused over a
million proletarians to titanic battle. St. Petersburg was followed by the
outlying regions, where oppression of local nationalities had rendered the
already insufferable political yoke still more intolerable. Riga, Poland,
Odessa, the Caucasus—all in turn became centres of insurrection which
spread and gained in intensity with every month, with every week. It has now
reached the centre of Russia, the heart of the “true Russian”
regions, whose stability had longest been movingly eulogised by the
reactionaries. A number of circumstances explain this relative stability, i.e.,
backwardness, in the Russian central regions. These are: the less developed
forms of big industry which involves masses of workers but is less divorced from
the land and has in less measure concentrated proletarians in intellectual
centres; the greater distances from foreign countries; the absence of national
discord. The labour movement, which manifested itself with such great force in
this region as far back as 1885-86, seemed to have died down for a long time,
and the obstacles presented by the particularly difficult local conditions of
work frustrated the efforts of the Social-Democrats scores of times.

Butat last things began to move in the central areas too. The
Ivanovo-Voznesensk strike[3]has revealed an unexpectedlyhigh degree of political maturity in the workers. Ever since this
strike the entire central industrial region has been in a state of unrest, which
has been steadily developing, gaining in intensity and sweep. This unrest has
now begun to manifest itself openly in the form of an uprising. Without any
doubt the outbreak was intensified by the revolutionary students in Moscow, who
have just passed a resolution, quite analogous to the St. Petersburg resolution,
branding the State Duma, calling for a struggle on behalf of a republic and for
the establishment of a provisional revolutionary government. The
“liberal” professors, who had just selected a most liberal rector,
the notorious Mr. Trubetskoi, closed the University under the pressure of police
threats; as they themselves said, they were afraid of a repetition of
the Tiflis shambles[4]within the University walls. They thereby merely
precipitated bloodshed in the streets, outside the University.

Asfar as we can judge from the brief telegrams in the foreign press, the course
of events in Moscow was the “customary” one, which has, so to speak,
become the regular thing ever since January 9. It began with a compositors’
strike, which spread rapidly. On Saturday, September 24 (October 7), the
printing-shops, electric trains, and tobacco factories were already at a
standstill. No newspapers appeared, and a general strike of factory and railway
workers was expected. In the evening big demonstrations were held, attended,
besides the compositors, by workers of other trades, students, and so on. The
Cossacks and gendarmes dispersed the demonstrators time and again, but they kept
reassembling. Many policemen were injured; the demonstrators used stones and
revolvers; an officer in command of the gendarmes was severely injured. One
Cossack officer and one gendarme were killed, and so on.

OnSaturday the bakers joined the strike.

OnSunday, September 25 (October 8), events at once took an ominous turn. From
11 a. m. workers began to assemble in the streets—especially on Strastnoi
Boulevard and elsewhere. The crowd sang theMarseillaise.
Printing-shops which refused to go on strike were wrecked. It was only after
overcoming stubborn resistance that the Cossacks managed to disperse the
demonstrators.

Acrowd of about 400, consisting chiefly of bakery apprentices assembled in
      front of Filippov’s shop, near the Governor General’s residence. The crowd
      was attacked by Cossacks. The workers made their way into houses, climbed
      on to roofs, and showered the Cossacks with stones. The Cossacks opened
      fire at the roofs and, unable to dislodge the workers, resorted to a
      regular siege. One house was surround ed. A detachment of police and two
      companies of grenadiers made a flank movement, penetrated into the house
      from the rear and finally occupied the roof too. One hundred and
      ninety-two apprentices were arrested. Eight of them were injured and two
      workers were killed (we repeat that these are all telegraphic reports in
      the foreign press, of course, far from complete and providing only an
      approximate idea of the scale of the fighting). A reputable Belgian
      newspaper has published a report that janitors were busy cleaning the
      streets of traces of blood. This minor detail, it says, testifies to the
      seriousness of the struggle more than lengthy reports can.

St.Petersburg papers seem to have been allowed to write about the massacre in
Tverskaya Street. However, on the very next day the censor became frightened of
publicity, so that official reports as of Monday, September 26 (October 9)
stated that there had been no serious disturbances in Moscow. A different story
was contained in telephone messages reaching St. Petersburg newspapers. It
appears that the crowd reassembled near the Governor General’s house, where
sharp clashes took place. The Cossacks opened fire several times. As they
dismounted to fire, their horses trampled on many people. In the evening crowds
of workers thronged the boulevards, shouting revolutionary slogans and holding
red banners aloft. The crowd wrecked bakers and gunsmiths’ shops. They were
finally dispersed by the police. Many were injured. A company of soldiers are
standing guard at the Central Telegraph office. The bakers’ strike has become
general. Unrest among the students is still mounting, their assemblies growing
ever larger and more revolutionary. The St. Petersburg correspondent ofThe
Timesreports that leaflets with a call to fight have been circulated in
St. Petersburg, that unrest is rife among the bakers there, that a demonstration
has been fixed forSaturday, October 1(14), and that the public are greatly alarmed.

Meagreas this information is, it nevertheless leads us to the conclusion that
the insurrectionary outbreak in Moscow is not a relatively high stage of the
movement, compared with the others. No previously trained and well-armed
revolutionary contingents were in evidence; no section of the troops went over
to the side of the people, nor was wide use made of bombs, the “new”
type of popular armament (which created such panic among the Cossacks and
soldiers in Tiflis on September 26 [October 91). In the absence of any of these
conditions, it was impossible to count either on the arming of a large number of
workers, or on the victory of the uprising. As we have already pointed out, the
Moscow events are of moment for quite a different reason: they mark the baptism
of fire of a big centre, the involvement of an enormous industrial region in a
serious struggle.

Theuprising in Russia does not and cannot, of course, advance at an even and
regular rate. The outstanding feature of the St. Petersburg events of January 9
was the rapid and unanimous movement of huge masses, unarmed and not out for
battle, who nevertheless received a great lesson in the struggle. In Poland and
in the Caucasus the movement is characterised by great stubbornness and the
relatively more frequent use of arms and bombs by the population. The events in
Odessa were distinguished by the fact that part of the troops went over to the
rebels. In all cases and at all times, the movement has been essentially
proletarian, inseparably merged with the mass strike. In Moscow the movement
proceeded along the same lines, as was the case in a number of other and smaller
industrial centres.

Thequestion which naturally arises now is: will the revolutionary movement stop
at the stage of development it has already reached, a stage which has become
“customary” and familiar, or will it advance to a higher level? If
we venture into the field of appraisal of such intricate and incalculable events
as those of the Russian revolution, we shall inevitably arrive at the conclusion
that the second alternative is infinitely the more probable. True, even the
present form of struggle, already rehearsed if we may use such an
expression—guerilla warfare, constant strikes,wearing down the enemy in street fighting, now in this part of the country, now
      in another—this form of struggle has also yielded and continues to
      yield very important results. No state is able to withstandà la

			     longue[1]a stubborn struggle of this sort, which brings industrial life
    to a standstill, introduces utter demoralisation into the bureaucracy and
    the army, and spreads dissatisfaction with the existing state of affairs
    among all sections of the people. Still less is the Russian autocratic
    government capable of enduring such a struggle. We may be quite confident
    that a persistent continuation of the struggle, even in forms that have
    already been created by the working-class movement, will inevitably bring
    about the collapse of tsarism.

However,it is highly improbable that the revolutionary movement in present-day
Russia will halt at the stage it has already reached. On the contrary, all the
facts indicate rather that this is only an initial stage in the struggle. Far
from all the consequences of the shameful and ruinous war have as yet been felt
by the people. The economic crisis in the cities and famine in the villages are
exacerbating public feeling. Judging by available information, the Manchurian
army is in an extremely revolutionary temper, and the government is afraid to
bring it back—yet it is impossible not to bring it back in view of the
danger of new and even more serious uprisings. Never before has political
agitation among the workers and peasants in Russia been so wide spread, so
methodical, or so far-reaching. The State Duma farce inevitably entails fresh
defeats for the government, and fresh ill-will in the population. Within the
last ten months or so, the insurrection has grown tremendously before our very
eyes, and the conclusion that the uprising will soon reach a new and higher
stage, wherein fighting detachments of revolutionaries or of mutinous military
units will come to the assistance of the multitude, helping the masses to
procure arms, and introducing the greatest vacillation into the ranks of the
“tsarist” (still tsarist, but already far from wholly tsarist)
troops, wherein the uprising will lead to an importantvictorywhich
tsarism will be unable to recover from—this conclusion is not a figment of
theimagination or a piece of wishful thinking, but one that stems directly and
necessarily from the facts of the mass struggle.

Thetsar’s troops were victorious over the workers in Moscow. This victory has
not enfeebled the vanquished, but has only welded them more closely together,
deepened their hatred, and brought them closer to the practical tasks of a
serious struggle. It is one of those victories that cannot fail to introduce
vacillation in the ranks of the victors. Only now are the troops beginning to
learn, and to learn not only by looking up laws but from their own experience,
that they are being mobilised wholly and exclusively to fight the “enemy
at home”. The war with Japan is over, but mobilisation continues,
mobilisationagainst the revolution.Suchmobilisation holds no terrors
for us, nor do we hesitate to welcome it, for the greater the number of soldiers
called upon to wage a systematic struggle against the people, the more rapidly
will the political and revolutionary education of these soldiers proceed. By
mobilising ever new military units to wage war on the revolution, tsarism is
delaying the issue, but such delay is of the greatest advantage to us, for in
such protracted guerilla warfare the proletarians will learn how to fight, while
the army will inevitably be drawn into political life, and the call of that
life, the militant call of young Russia, is penetrating even the tightly locked
doors of the army barracks, is awakening even the most ignorant, the most
backward, and the most cowed.

Aninsurrectionary outbreak has once more been sup pressed. Once more we say:
Hail the insurrection!

[1]For a long time.—Ed.

[2]Days of Bloodshed in Moscowis a draft of the
article “The Political Strike and the Street Fighting in Moscow”,
which is published in this volume on pages 347-55.

[3]The Ivanovo-Voznesensk strike, which began at the
end of May and lasted till early August in 1905, involved about 70,000 workers
of both sexes. Leadership was provided by the Northern Committee of the
Bolsheviks. During the strike the workers formed a Council of Workers’
Representatives which in fact was one of the earliest Soviets of Workers’
Deputies in Russia.

[4]The police fired on Tiflis workers who had gathered on August 29
(September 11), 1905 in the building of the City Council to
discuss the elections to the State Duma. By order of the tsarist authorities,
the police and the Cossacks surrounded the building, broke into the hall where
over 2,000 persons were assembled, and fell upon them. Sixty people were killed
and about 300 injured.

Allover the Caucasus—in Tiflis, Kutaisi, Sukhumi, etc.— political
demonstrations and strikes took place in protest against the crimes perpetrated
by the tsarist regime. Leaflets calling for an armed uprising against the
autocracy were published by the Tiflis Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. and No. 18 ofProletarydated September 26 (13), 1905 carried a special bulletin
signed by the Caucasian League Committee regarding the events in
Tiflis.